Negative Nancy

Today was a big run at the end of a big week. This was the “bring you to the breaking point” week in my training plan and break me it did. 18 miles this morning – I’d say I ran 14 of it with A LOT of walking the last 4. How does “just” 2 more miles break me after a solid 16 the week before?

Unfortunately while I was in the run my head was filled with the negative thoughts. You know then, “who are you kidding? You can’t break 4!” and “your knee is giving out, you aren’t young enough, you aren’t strong enough to try this yet.” Fortunately, after seeing fellow runners lament about how equally horrible their runs were today, I felt a little better, reminded myself that tomorrow was a rest day and that Monday was a fresh start, and I slowly started to build back my confidence.

I need to work on the “in the moment” negative talk deflection. I started a guided mediation course this week at work, thank you Hanover!, and the basis of much of it is consistency. Doing a session every day to teach your mind how to “let go”, how to “breath” and how to “build yourself up”. This week was the first week and I’m admittedly struggling to keep thoughts out of my head BUT they say that’s normal and where the consistency comes in. Basically I’m in a meditation training plan and it conveniently finishes the week of the marathon.

The medication sessions are practice and my inability to refocus and shift the negative thoughts to the positive was a strong reminder that I need to practice my positive thoughts – out loud and often!

Here are some of the positive mantras I’m considering:

You Are Strong

Head Up

Knees Up

Run to Buns (Susan)

Run To Andy

You put in the work

Trust the plan

Go Big Or Go Home

I’ll be giving these options a whirl in the coming weeks – two 20 milers coming up after this week’s pull back should provide some “great” real life testing (Who’s idea was this?!?!?)

What are your mantras? How long did you practice before they came naturally?